New Rover Pictures Show Mars Crater "Like Mojave Desert"

August 9, 2012—New images from the Mars Curiosity rover show a crater looking like the Mojave Desert, according to a NASA scientist. The rover's cameras also reveal indentations on the pebbly surface, likely created by the spacecraft's landing thruster jets.

New Rover Pictures Show Mars Crater "Like Mojave Desert"

August 9, 2012—New images from the Mars Curiosity rover show a crater looking like the Mojave Desert, according to a NASA scientist. The rover's cameras also reveal indentations on the pebbly surface, likely created by the spacecraft's landing thruster jets.

Even before the Mars Curiosity rover rolled its wheels across the Martian surface, it had left its marks in the soil.

This photo shows indentations, likely from the jet thrusters of the rover's landing craft. And it's not just holes in the ground.

The excavation reveals likely bedrock, indicating that the surface soil is shallow.

Curiosity is equipped with the highest resolution cameras ever placed on the planet, far improved from equipment on rovers sent to Mars years ago.

Curiosity's new home in Gale Crater doesn't look a whole lot different from parts of Earth.

SOUNDBITE: John Grotzinger, MSL Project Scientist, Caltech: "The first impression that you get is how Earth-like this seems, looking at that landscape. You would really be forgiven for thinking that NASA was trying to pull a fast one on you and we actually put a rover out in the Mojave Desert and took a picture."

Other early images include a self-portrait, captured from Curiosity's mast.

Its first panoramic view, with the crater rim seen at center, and the rover's body is in the foreground, with the shadow of its mast, poking up to the right.

And some video, too. This, taken from the Mars Descent Imager, shows the "flying-saucer-like" heat shield dropping away during the rover's landing.

And finally, one of the rover's destinations looms in the background: Mount Sharp, a nearly three-and-a-half mile high mountain, higher than Mt. Rainier.

New Rover Pictures Show Mars Crater "Like Mojave Desert"

August 9, 2012—New images from the Mars Curiosity rover show a crater looking like the Mojave Desert, according to a NASA scientist. The rover's cameras also reveal indentations on the pebbly surface, likely created by the spacecraft's landing thruster jets.